Hohoho, Friedman said:<\/p>\n
It\u2019s for all these reasons that I\u2019ve been calling them \u201dGeneration Q\u201d\u009d \u2014 the Quiet Americans, in the best sense of that term, quietly pursuing their idealism, at home and abroad.<\/p>\n
But Generation Q may be too quiet, too online, for its own good, and for the country\u2019s own good. When I think of the huge budget deficit, Social Security deficit and ecological deficit that our generation is leaving this generation, if they are not spitting mad, well, then they\u2019re just not paying attention. And we\u2019ll just keep piling it on them.<\/p>\n
[…]<\/p>\n
Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy didn\u2019t change the world by asking people to join their Facebook crusades or to download their platforms. Activism can only be uploaded, the old-fashioned way \u2014 by young voters speaking truth to power, face to face, in big numbers, on campuses or the Washington Mall. Virtual politics is just that \u2014 virtual.<\/p>\n
Maybe that\u2019s why what impressed me most on my brief college swing was actually a statue \u2014 the life-size statue of James Meredith at the University of Mississippi. Meredith was the first African-American to be admitted to Ole Miss in 1962. The Meredith bronze is posed as if he is striding toward a tall limestone archway, re-enacting his fateful step onto the then-segregated campus \u2014 defying a violent, angry mob and protected by the National Guard.<\/p>\n
Above the archway, carved into the stone, is the word \u201dCourage.\u201d\u009d That is what real activism looks like. There is no substitute. [Generation Q<\/em><\/a>. Thomas L. Friedman. NYT. October 10 2007]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I suspect young guns in PKR would nod in agreement, at least in Malaysian context.<\/p>\n